Following the World Trade Center attack of February 1993, what did the Clinton administration do to protect the United States from future terrorism? Did they adopt a comprehensive counter terrorism plan as well as a domestic preparedness capability? Despite the former president’s claims in his ‘My Life” memoir, they did not.

Senator Clinton is running for the White House on her record as First Lady between 1993 and 2001, and on her Senate service. That record, however it’s parsed — be it her record or her husband’s — is devoid of critical achievements in counter-terrorism.

Americans have been told again and again that the US had a homeland security policy in place when President Bush first took office as well as a policy to deal with stopping terrorism here and abroad. But that’s simply false: There was no strategy for stopping terrorism nor was there a strategy for homeland security.

In a closed briefing to a House subcommittee in the summer of 2000, nearly 8 years after the first World Trade Center attacks, a senior Clinton White House official stunned the staff by ridiculing the notion of adopting a “comprehensive counter terrorism” strategy, saying such a policy would be “silly.” He further said that even outlining the likely terrorist threats to the United States — a task the subcommittee professional staff encouraged the White House to do–was not doable because “of all the different threats.”

As for adopting a preparedness plan to deal with domestic terrorist attacks, the official said the White House “was looking at” putting forward such a plan, this nearly a decade after the WTC attacks and four years after the Morrow building in Oklahoma City was destroyed. The official — when asked how the administration might assign priorities to the $12.9 billion then in the budget for counter terrorism efforts — simply gave the Committee staff a list of terror organizations.

The subcommittee was trying to assess the US government-wide attempts to “detect, deter, prevent and respond to terrorist acts.” The Committee wrote the White House official in July 2000 asking when an integrated threat assessment would be prepared, when a comprehensive counter terrorism plan would be adopted and how the government would prioritize government-wide spending to combat terrorism. No reply was ever forthcoming.

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The CIA Inspector General released a report last week detailing the intelligence failures leading up to the September 11 terrorist attacks, reserving its harshest criticisms for former CIA Director George Tenet, who, according to the report lacked a “documented, comprehensive” approach to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda.

Tenet should certainly be held accountable for whatever role he played in the lack of U.S. preparedness with respect to terrorism. However, as New York Times editorial page correctly noted, warnings were issued, and ignored, by Tenet’s first boss, President Bill Clinton:

“The C.I.A. inspector general’s report on the agency’s failures before Sept. 11 was devastating — but not because it showed that America’s spies missed the rise of Al Qaeda. George Tenet, then the director of central intelligence, rang the Qaeda alarm. He sent a memo to the entire intelligence community saying that he wanted no effort spared in the ‘war’ with Osama bin Laden. He took on the president’s closest advisers to agitate for a strike on a Qaeda base in Afghanistan. The disturbing thing was that this all happened under President Bill Clinton.”

This certainly squares with a Judicial Watch investigation into the September 11 attacks. Update readers may recall that in 2005, Judicial Watch obtained a declassified document, dated August 19, 1996, that very clearly articulated the threat bin Laden posed to the United States.

According to the report, provocatively entitled, “Osama bin Laden: Who’s Chasing Whom?” at the time, bin Laden’s many passports and his private plane allowed him considerable freedom to travel “with little fear of being intercepted or tracked.” The report also warns that bin Laden’s prolonged stay in Afghanistan “could prove more dangerous to U.S. interests in the long run than his three-year liaison with Khartoum.”

It goes on… “[Bin Laden’s] informal and transnational network of businesses and associates remains resilient…[He] can retain the capability to support individuals and groups who have the motive and wherewithal to attack U.S. interests almost worldwide.”

There is plenty of bipartisan blame to go around for the federal government’s pre-9/11 failure to protect the American people from the threat of terrorism, in general, and Osama bin Laden, in particular. However, the first and most obvious mistakes were made by Bill Clinton and his national security team. Had they acted aggressively, September 11 may never have happened. And no amount of revisionist history can change that fact.

Source: Front Page Magazine

Read Part One HERE

Read Part Two HERE

Although Republican Rep. Curt Weldon’s suburban Philadelphia district had given John Kerry a slight majority of its votes in 2004, Weldon secured 59 percent of the votes against his Democratic opponent. On the surface, he was not a likely Democratic target for 2006.

And yet the Clintons and their allies would invest more money and energy in Weldon’s removal than that of any other congressman. And for one good reason: The intrepid Weldon posed a genuine risk to Bill’s legacy and Hillary’s future. By means fair or foul, he had to go.

Initiating the removal was one Melanie Sloan, a former assistant United States attorney and now the executive director of the George Soros-funded watchdog group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

It was Sloan who filed the complaint against Weldon after his name surfaced in a 2004 Los Angeles Times articles listing the various members of Congress whose children were lobbyists. Although Weldon was one of 28 such congressmen listed and had been cleared by a congressional ethics committee, Sloan and her collaborators zeroed in on him alone.

Unbeknownst to Weldon, the FBI had opened an investigation into his and his daughter’s business interests some time in the spring of 2006, roughly 18 months after Sloan filed her complaint and just about the time the campaign of Weldon’s opponent, Joe Sestak, was kicking into high gear.

Although Sloan would claim to be mystified by the FBI’s delay in investigating Weldon, future events would suggest a coordinated effort within the Department of Justice and possibly the FBI.

In the summer or early fall of 2006, the FBI formally referred the Weldon matter to the Department of Justice’s Public Integrity Section for follow-up. Public Integrity is the home of, among others, Howard Sklamberg, one of the Democratic sympathizers within the DOJ responsible for the preposterously light sentence meted out to Weldon target Sandy Berger.

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Read Part One HERE

I met Rep. Curt Weldon for the first (and only) time in July 2006. He graciously consented to assist me in some research I was doing. I, in turn, was able to help connect some of the dots in the chain of forces aligned against him.

All dots led to former national security adviser and current chairman of the "global strategy firm," Stonebridge Resources, Sandy Berger. As Weldon then knew, Berger would not go down easily.

In fact, Berger was in the process of pulling off a brazen, political drive-by on Weldon, the one legislator who most seriously threatened the Clinton legacy and his own reputation.

Berger began his spring offensive in March 2006 with a fundraiser for Weldon’s opponent in the 2006 House race, Joe Sestak, a former vice admiral forced into retirement for what the U.S. Navy charitably called "poor command climate."

Before being recruited to run for Congress by the Clinton shadow government, Sestak had expressed no political ambitions and had not lived in Weldon’s district for 30 years.

Although hosted by Berger, the fundraiser was held at the law offices of Harold Ickes, a veteran Clinton fixer, and Janice Enright, the treasurer of Hillary Clinton’s 2006 Senate campaign.

Kicking in to support Sestak was a who’s who of Clinton national security exiles. These included former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Richard "Against All Enemies" Clarke, former National Security Adviser Anthony Lake, former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta and Hillary Clinton herself.

Berger was not the only Sestak supporter to have a cloud hanging over his head. Donor John Deutch, formerly director of central intelligence, had signed a criminal plea agreement in connection with his mishandling of national secrets a day before being pardoned by the outgoing President Clinton.

Another interesting contribution came in from Mary O. McCarthy, recently fired from the CIA after failing a polygraph on leaked classified information in regards to CIA prisons overseas. As it happened, a timely leak shortly before the 2006 election would ultimately do Weldon in.

Before the campaign was through, Clinton insiders would enlist Stonebridge’s director of communications to serve as Sestak’s campaign spokesperson, summon former president Clinton to rally the troops, and finally call in the federales.

Their reasons for supporting Sestak were transparent even to the local media. "A Sestak victory," observed suburban Philadelphia’s Delco Times early in the campaign, "would muzzle a Republican congressman who blames Clinton for doing irreparable harm to America’s national security during the 1990s."

That Berger was in a position to orchestrate this offensive amazed just about anyone who had followed Berger’s recent career.

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From World Net Daily

When the history of the Bush era is written, no scandal will impress the reader as more telling of the time and place than the one that has engulfed Curt Weldon, the deposed Republican congressman from Pennsylvania.

To be clear, Weldon is not the perpetrator of this scandal but its victim. To understand how he got embroiled, a quick look back at a nearly forgotten chapter in the annals of the Clinton administration is in order.

In January 1997, the Clinton White House went public with a 332-page report that bore the "Austin Powers"-like title, "Communication Stream of Conspiracy Commerce." In its unapologetic paranoia, the effort recalled nothing so much as the final days of the Nixon administration.

"What is striking about the document," observed the Washington Post, "is that it lays down this suspicion-laden theory about how the media works in cold print, under the imprimatur of the White House." According to the document, here is how "the stream" worked:

First, well-funded right-wing think tanks and individuals underwrite conservative newsletters and newspapers such as the Western Journalism Center, the American Spectator and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Next, the stories are reprinted on the Internet where they are bounced all over the world.

From the Internet, according to the report, the stories go through the right-wing British media, back through the respectable right-wing American press, into Congress, "finally to be covered by the remainder of the American mainstream press as a ‘real’ story."

A year after its introduction, Hillary Clinton would echo the findings of this report on the Today Show in her self-parodying alarm about a "vast right-wing conspiracy."

The Clintons would not be caught on the defensive again. To neutralize their opposition, they and their cronies have consciously crafted their own communication stream, one that is far less ethical and more effective than anything the right could have ever concocted.

I hesitate to call this a "left wing" conspiracy as there is no real ideology involved. Indeed, some on the hard left have applauded the work Weldon has done in tracking the steps and missteps that led to Sept. 11.

Properly understood, the Clinton communication stream has resulted from a collaboration, not of ideologues, but of well-placed Democratic activists whose motives involve some combination of fear, greed, spite, wishful thinking and lust for power.

These collaborators did not have to rely on Arkansas state troopers to leak private information. They had – and have – allies working within the FBI, the CIA and the Justice Department.

They have not depended on the generosity of one millionaire for support, like a Richard Mellon Scaife, but rather on an influential cluster of unscrupulous plutocrats called the Democratic Alliance.

For coordination, they have been able to count on an aggressive and effective George Soros-funded "watchdog" group called Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, or CREW.

For influence, they have been able to mobilize much of the Clinton shadow government, especially Sandy Berger and his Stonebridge Group, as well as former president Clinton himself.

But most critical of all, they have had direct access to and cooperation from the media: To be sure, not the American Spectator or the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, but the hugely more powerful voices of the mainstream media, the New York Times, CNN, CBS, NBC and more.

These same media that functioned – and still do – as a firewall in the service of the Clintons serve now as sappers in the undermining of their enemies.

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BY MARY MITCHELL Sun-Times Columnist

Sen. Hillary Clinton’s really got — well, you know. No matter how well-intended, the average white politician can’t get away with trotting out a "black speech" before black audiences without being accused of shameless pandering.

But Clinton came to the National Association of Black Journalists Convention in Las Vegas last week and did just that.

I can’t say with certainty that Clinton doesn’t ever mention "It takes a village to raise a child" when addressing white audiences, but the African proverb is usually tossed out at least once when she’s speaking to a black one.

In fact, the speech she delivered during what was billed as "A Conversation with America’s Candidates" was Clinton’s urban manifesto.

The former first lady lamented the crisis of 1.4 million young black males between the ages of 16 and 24 "who are out of school and out of work and too often out of hope," and pointed out that nearly one out of every three young African-American men are not "earning legal wages or learning marketable skills.

"They grow up without fathers, wind up in prison, or end up losing their lives, or taking lives due to guns and violence," Clinton said. "We’ve been wringing our hands and listening to this exact same conversation for years. Well, I reject that conversation. I reject a conversation that paints with a broad brush 1.4 million young men as a threat, as a headache, or as a lost cause. I reject it as a string of disappointments, failures, casualties of a broken system. It is not who they are and not what they can be. I think it is time we shifted the conversation."

I wholeheartedly agree.

Her husband is partly to blame for some of our woes

This is a conversation that should be shifted to the white establishment across America where jobs, resources and political clout are controlled. I understand that the campaign cycle is brutal, and a candidate can’t possibly have a speech to fit every occasion, but Clinton basically gave black journalists the same speech she recently delivered to the National Urban League.

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This coming from the guy who wouldn’t go after Bin Laden. Amazing!

From Sun Sentinal.com

Bill Clinton accused President George W. Bush on Friday of having "forgotten about our hunt for Bin Laden," and told Newsday the president’s Iraq policy had spawned swarms of new terror recruits.

Speaking after his first joint appearance with his wife in New Hampshire, the former president said he mostly supports a recent intelligence estimate reportedly indicating that al-Qaida has gained back much of its strength since 9/11.

"Our defenses are better but we may have more people trying to pierce them," Clinton said as he signed autographs outside of Keene High School.

I agree with what Hillary has said that the homeland is not safe enough but that is more safe from attack than it was pre-9/11 because there are so many people out there around the world cooperating with us," he added.

"That’s the good news… The bad news is that there’s no question our policy in Iraq and the fact that we pursued it virtually alone has generated a lot more recruiting from the people who don’t like us or the British."

Proving that he’s just as adept at stuffing an election candidate’s coffers as he is at stuffing his own socks, Sandy Berger hosted an "almost secret" Washington fund-raiser for a recently retired three-star vice admiral last night.

 Vice Adm. Joseph Sestak Jr, as the Village People would say, is "In the Navy".

And when you want to take an Able Danger Congressman Curt Weldon down, what better way than to send in the Navy?

Berger, dubbed "Sandy Burglar" by radio meister Rush Limbaugh, gained notoriety for trying to stuff classified documents into his socks and other attire. The man, who served as President Bill Clinton’s second-term national security adviser, pleaded guilty last year to removing classified material from the National Archives. He originally claimed it was an "honest mistake", but later owned up that he took the terrorism documents by hiding them, schoolboy fashion in his jacket–then cut some of them up with scissors.

The almost-secret fundraiser Berger hosted for Navy Man Sestak Jr. was revealed in a story by the Delaware County Daily Times.

"As a general rule, campaigns don’t comment on fund-raisers or people who hold them," said Sestak’s campaign chairman, Myles Duffy.

"I don’t know why this fund-raiser is so secretive–other than the fact that it is a fund-raiser hosted by a convicted felon, a man convicted of destroying information dealing with pre-9/11 intelligence," said Russ Caso, Weldon’s chief of staff.

Berger’s bungled sleuthing, which was deemed a misdemeanor that came complete with a $50,000 fine, 100 hours of community service and two years of probation, should have eared him a movie stint. Instead, he ended up as an adviser with two other Clintonistas on ABC’s hit show Commander in Chief. .

"What do they have to hide about this?" Caso asked. "I know what they have to hide: it’s an embarrassment."

In Berger’s real life, non-televised efforts on behalf of Sestak, everyone’s in on the act.

Sestak’s campaign, which has raised more than $150,000 since its Feb. 2 launch, includes about $50,000 that was raised with the help of sometimes thespian Senator John Kerry.

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Democrats were horrified to learn of phone monitoring of suspected terrorist - but are ok with "data mining" of potential voters.

A group of well-connected Democrats led by a former top aide to Bill Clinton is raising millions of dollars to start a private firm that plans to compile huge amounts of data on Americans to identify Democratic voters

Read it all here

The reason this is being surpressed is to protect Clinton Lawyers still in the Pentegon, CIA and State Department. Hillary Hired Jamie Gorrelick, who put in place the "Wall" that prevented the CIA from sharing information with the FBI. This wall is known as the "Gorrelick Wall" and is what prevented Able Danger in stopping 9-11.

Through computer scanning of some 2.5 terabytes of classified and unclassified data, the Able Danger team identified five "nodes" of al-Qaeda activity. One was in Brooklyn, N.Y. Another was in the port of Aden in Yemen, where the USS Cole was attacked.

Able Danger linked Mohamed Atta and three other 9/11 hijackers to the Brooklyn cell, said Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, who was the liaison between the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Able Danger team. "It shocked us how entrenched a presence al-Qaeda had in the United States," Mr. Kleinsmith said. Colonel Shaffer testified he tried three times to have Able Danger data on the Brooklyn cell presented to the FBI, but that on each occasion Pentagon lawyers forbade the meeting.
In a commentary in the Wall Journal last November, Louis Freeh, who was FBI director at the time, said that if he had been told about what Able Danger had learned, 9/11 likely would have been prevented. In March, 2000, Mr. Kleinsmith was ordered to stop all work on Able Danger, and, later, to delete all the information collected.

Read it all here

And some interesting information here

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